Forged in Battle (18 page)

“If something happens to me then you will have to look after
the inn and the other boys.”

Josh nodded. He leant against the doorframe and then pushed
off and walked towards the only parent he had ever known. Josh put his arms
around Guthrie’s waist, and Guthrie put his arms around the boy—overcome by
the sudden display of emotion.

Neither of them wanted Guthrie to go, but the bells were
ringing frantically.

Guthrie felt strange as he descended the staircase, thinking
it might be for the last time. He stopped in his bar for a moment and had a good
look round. He didn’t know what he was doing with a sword at his waist, going to
fight like this. He was a barman not a soldier. But there were things that a man
could not run from. And this was one, he thought as he unbolted the front door
and let himself out. He had not asked the beastmen to come—but they had come
regardless and, he told himself as he closed the inn door behind him, he would
fight.

Flames licked up the side of the house, and smoke swirled
under the rafters and billowed inside.

Andres wiped the tears from his eyes and rested the
zweihänder on his shoulder to get a moment’s rest, coughing with the smoke and
the sudden exertion. At least the smoke affected the beastmen as much as the
men.

To his left one of the mill-hands, a boy from Burhens called
Gunner, was keeping the beastmen at bay with a table leg. As far as he knew, the
other mill-hands were dead.

“Keep them back!” Andres shouted, and he felt that he was a
young man again, back to back with his brothers. His forehead dripped seat, his
arms ached and he had not realised how unfit he had become. He prepared himself
for more exertion, braced his wooden foot, and caught a small beastman on the
arm, shattering the bone. A beastman tried to duck in under the swing, but
Gunner drove it back and Andres recovered his balance. He was about to thank
Gunner when he saw the young lad double over and stagger forward.

Flames were leaping up the inside of the walls, and they
lapped along the rafters. The noise was deafening and the heat became stifling.
Andres coughed and swung his sword blindly into the smoke. On the third swing he
caught something. There was a satisfying roar of pain. Andres pushed the tumbled
kitchen table out of his way and backed across the living room.

He stumbled on a dead body and saw Josen, his throat torn
out, a bloody kitchen knife still clutched in his hand and then a beastman leapt
the kitchen table and drove straight at him.

Andres executed the creature and then swung the greatsword in
a wide arc, driving the beastmen back over the fallen chairs. Outside there was
a inarticulate scream of agony. The voice was unmistakably human.

Maybe his men were not all dead, after all.

His sword felt light and easy in his hand. He laughed as he
slashed out and felt the blade strike home. One of the beastmen dropped its
spear and lowered its head to gore him, but he twisted his wrist so that the
sword was vertical and stabbed it through the back of the neck. An untrained man
might have aimed for the spine, but Andres aimed well to the side—where the
arteries connected neck and head and opened them up in a spray of blood that
made the other beasts snort with bloodlust—even though it was one of their
own.

No goat-beast was going to take him alive, Andres thought,
and stabbed another foul creature in the windpipe.

The smoke was almost impenetrable, and the heat in the main
room was unbearable. Andres crouched low under the smoke and backed into his
bedroom, hearing the snorts and grunts as the beastmen followed.

Andres kicked a chair out of the way and backed into a
corner, the greatsword stretched in front of him. There was a moment’s pause
before the beastmen dared to step into the room and Andres wiped the sweat from
his forehead and his hands, then braced himself, his greatsword thirsty for more
blood.

He had chosen, and here—unseen and unremembered—would be
where he would die.

* * *

On the eastern wall of Helmstrumburg a crowd gathered to
watch Andres Jorg’s mill burn. The flames reached a hundred feet into the air,
lighting the waters of the Stir with a thousand tiny sparks.

Hengle joined the crowd then ran through the streets back to
the marketplace. He slipped on the cobblestones and scrambled up the steps and
up the narrow staircase to the back room he shared with his mother.

“The mill’s burning!” he said.

“And your father?”

Hengle didn’t know. “No one has seen him,” he said.

“What about Gunner and the others?”

Hengle shook his head. His mother bit back her tears,
determined not to cry. Andres would have escaped, she told herself, even though
she doubted the truth of the words. He wouldn’t have stayed to fight, would he,
she asked herself—even though, in her heart, she knew the answer. He would die
rather than let beastmen drive him from his mill.

Sigmund rode hard along the Kemperbad Road, foam splattering
down the horse’s flanks as he drove it on. Half a mile from town there was a low
defile to the left, and on the right a patch of trees grew close to the road. As
Sigmund approached, five beastmen ran out of the copse, attempting to intercept
him. He used the ends of the reins to swat the flanks of his mount. They
outpaced the beastmen, but behind him a crude horn sounded and Sigmund felt
trapped, as if the alarm had been sounded and the whole forest would now be
ready for him.

As he passed through a dense patch of forest the bank where
his father’s mill stood came into view. It was clearly visible in the darkness,
flames reaching a hundred feet into the night air.

A hundred yards off he drew his horse to a halt. Both the
mill and the house were ablaze: flames leaping hundreds of feet into the air.
Sigmund could see figures outside—horned figures—illuminated by the
conflagration running away from the heat. He could feel the warmth on his cheek:
it bathed the forests with a ruddy light. Roof timbers crashed down in the
house. The mill wheel kept slowly revolving as the rest of the building began to
collapse.

There was no way anything was still alive in there. His
father must be dead, Sigmund realised—but there was no lime to grieve. His
mount seemed ready to collapse with exhaustion and it snorted with alarm at the
scent of smoke. Sigmund looked away from the flames into the dark shade of the
trees. He was sure that he saw two horned figures detach themselves from the
shadows and start silently towards him. The horse stamped with alarm and Sigmund
turned it round. He’d never trained in fighting from horseback, but to dismount
would be suicide in the forests at night. He felt the nag stumble in the
darkness and cursed the creature’s age. He had pushed it too hard. If it died
here he would never make it back to Helmstrumburg. The horse pulled down on the
reins as if it was trying to lie down. Sigmund suspected that if it fell then it
would never stand again. He had to keep the creature moving.

Sigmund spurred the horse towards the creatures—their
horned heads becoming visible as he got closer. Their eyes were fierce and their
crude lips were curled with ferocious snarls. The nearest had long fangs that
overlapped the bottom lip, the other’s teeth were blunt and yellowed, standing
out in irregular angles from enflamed red gums. Both had fetid breath that
Sigmund smelled as he rode past, parrying desperately.

There was nothing he could do here. It was stupid and
dangerous for him to come out at all. His father was dead. But there were
thousands of people in Helmstrumburg who needed him. Sigmund cursed his rashness
and spurred his horse forward. There was nothing more he could do to help his
father. His duty was with the town and his men.

Osric and Baltzer took a barrel each and hefted them onto
their shoulders.

“Where are we going to put these things?” Baltzer hissed.

Osric thought for a moment. “I know the perfect place!” he
grinned and set off towards the centre of town.

There was a crash as the roof of the main room fell in.
Scorching air blasted into the bedroom, and with it came a thick chocking smoke.

Andres choked and tried to blink away the stinging tears in
his eyes. There was a pile of dead beastmen at his feet, but he was almost
spent.

“Come on spawn of the Dark Gods!” Andres Jorg spat as he
heard the unmistakable tap of hoofed feet move towards him.

There was another crash as the kitchen roof collapsed. It
wouldn’t be long until the bedroom was an inferno too. Hooves tapped on the
floorboards as the beastmen inched forward. A thrust caught Andres on the thigh
and he gasped with pain and swung the greatsword—but his arms were now so weak
that there was no strength in the blow and it did little more than stun one of
the attackers.

Andres threw the greatsword away and drew his short sword. It
felt light as he parried another spear thrust and another. But this was an
impossible battle. Another jab caught him on the arm and he dropped the sword.

This was it. The beastmen dropped their spears, took out long
knives and moved in for the kill. There was a moment before Andres realised what
the beastmen intended and he promised himself that they would never take him
alive.

In the confined space there was a thunderous explosion and
one of the beastmen’s head exploded in a shower of brains and skull fragments.

Andres ducked and there was a flash and another explosion—but this time he could see what had caused it. A silver pistol appeared from the
smoke and rested against the temple of his last attacker. The beastman paused—confused that there should be anything behind it—then the trigger was pulled
and the round shot exploded from the other side of the creature’s head in a
shower of gore and imbedded itself in the wall.

“Here!” a voice shouted, but Andres had collapsed onto the
floor and all he saw was a hand. He felt himself being dragged up from the floor
then tipped through an open window, onto the slope at the back of the house.

Andres sucked in lungfuls of air—and then he saw his
saviour, a tall, thick man, with two pistol holsters at his waist and a few
singe marks on his fine jacket.

“Take this!” the man said. He took the cutlass from his waist
and handed it to Andres—then he fumbled to reload his pistols.

Andres shoved himself up. The wind was blowing the flames and
smoke away from the bedroom towards town, and Andres understood why it had taken
so long for the flames to spread to the bedroom. His head was clearing with each
breath of clean air. He felt the cutlass for balance for a moment before more
horned shapes appeared through the smoke. A pistol shot felled one and Andres
disembowelled the other.

“Run!” the man said, leading the way away from the house and
Andres stumped along on his peg leg with the speed of a two-legged man. His
saviour fumbled with his pistols, but he did not have time to reload before a
huge maddened beast charged down the slope.

The man threw a pistol into its face and it distracted the
animal long enough for Andres to hobble up and dispatch the creature with a
well-aimed slash across the throat.

They kept hurrying down the slope behind the mill and towards
the sluice that fed the water mill. The beastmen seemed so maddened with
blood-lust that they had forgotten the purpose of their attack. Andres and the
man hurried out of the circle of light around the blazing mill and along the
path of the water sluice.

There were two horses tethered to a tree and the man untied
the reins of one and thrust them towards Andres. It was a long time since Andres
had ridden a horse, but he set his good foot in the stirrup and pulled himself
up, managing to fit his peg into the other.

The man leapt into the saddle and moved his horse between
Andres and the mill.

“Ride!” the man shouted. “If you stay close to the river you
should be safe. Do not head into the hills!”

Andres’ horse shied for a moment, but he wrestled the
creature back under control and brought it round next to the man’s.

“Go!” the man shouted. “Please go! There’s no time to
explain! This is too important! Ride to Talabheim! Ask for Hoffman! The Black
Goat inn in Talabheim!”

The stranger seized the bridle of Andres’ horse and turned
its head away from the blazing buildings and out over the dark meadow towards
the road.

“Go!” he shouted. “Just go!”

Andres kicked his peg leg into the flank of his mount and it
jumped forward, eager to be away from the flames. He paused for a moment and
turned to watch the mill collapse in a shower of sparks. It was a beautiful
sight, but best of all, he was still alive.

As Sigmund drove his exhausted horse back to the city, he
could see a crowd of people standing on the eastern wall. The gates opened as he
approached, and a mob of forty armed men surged forward with a great roar—led
by Squire Becker’s Helmstrumburg Guard, with spears and shields, as he had
promised, and at the front the squire himself with an inherited breastplate,
brass buckler and rapier.

Sigmund almost smiled at the sight of the pompous aristocrat
and his motley band of soldiers, but he was exhausted by shock and grief and,
worst of all, failure.

“Captain Jorg!” Squire Becker said. He was a short plump man,
who seemed more suited to horseback hunts than armed service. “I have assembled
my men. Let’s march forth and punish these filthy animals!”

Sigmund glared down at him. He had wanted glory as much as
any man, but glory would not save the people of Helmstrumburg. And the care of
the whole town was his responsibility as captain of the army here.

“Squire Becker,” he spoke in a cold and clear voice. “You
will take your men back to town and await my orders. There is an army of
beastmen in the hills, and we will need each man we have. I will not have you
sally out and waste a single life—not even your own!”